Need to Understand
by M.L. Shards
Summary: Fifth and Sixth in Forgotten Series. She needs to know what's going on.
1. Chapter 1

And here's another one...still need a series name. I thought about Justin Vs PR like suggested except he's not really "Versus" them per say...Anyways please review, I'd like at least eight reviews before I update again if that's alright.

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Six days ago she'd watched him burst out of the science lab and down the hallway of the school like a Cheetah hotly pursued by her mentor. Six days ago she'd watched and listened to a conversation they'd had riddled with subtext and not been able to figure out any of it. Six days ago she'd seen her mentor go to Hayley's, red eyed and unwilling to talk, simply staring at his coffee in silence. Six days ago she'd followed her mentor home and asked what exactly was wrong; six days ago he'd refused to tell her.

Three days ago she'd decided she needed to know what was going on before she could sleep peacefully again.

Today she was standing outside a small house rapping her knuckles on the door, her science textbook and binder securely in her yellow backpack that was swung over her shoulder. She was nervously waiting for an answer.

She chewed a piece of bubblegum and blew a bubble silently praying someone was home because she doubted she'd get the nerve up to do this again if no one answered.

It popped on her face and she had barely gotten in back in her mouth when the door was pulled open by an older woman with dyed chestnut brown hair and green eyes who looked her up and down a few times.

"You looking for Justin?" she asked sighing as she brushed a strand of hair out of her eyes.

She nodded, "Uh, yeah," she responded as her heart rate sped up slightly and she attempted to remember the details of the story she'd made up, "Uh, he's supposed to be helping me with my science homework."

The woman nodded and held out her hand, "I'm Leslie and you are?" she trailed off expectantly.

"Kira," she responded shaking the woman's hand as she stepped into the house, "are you his mother?"

"Stepmother," she corrected as she let go of Kira's hand and gestured for her to take off her sneakers, "it's nice to see he's making friends, I told him going to High School here would help him out."

"Hmmm?" Kira asked as she stepped out of her shoes, dropping a few centimetres in height when she did.

Leslie nodded and gestured for Kira to follow her into the living room, "Yes, he's a very smart young man, already has a University degree you know." She stated proudly then sighed, "Horribly anti-social though, I thought maybe him going back to High School at the proper age would help him out, but he appears to hate me for it." She looked down sadly and Kira suddenly felt very uncomfortable with where the conversation was headed. "But you seem like a nice young lady like the friend's he had in Angel Grove when he was younger."

That caught her attention.

"Angel Grove?"

Leslie nodded, "Justin should be home in twenty minutes providing he keeps his word this time, would you like anything to eat?"

Kira shook her head, "No thanks, uh…perhaps I should wait in his room?" she suggested pushing her gum to the side of her mouth and desperately hoping for a chance to look around.

Leslie considered this possibility for a minute, "Well," she began slowly, "I suppose so, it's up the stairs, first door on the left."

Kira smiled and grabbed her bag before heading towards the stairs, "Thanks."

Thankful for the bit of information that Leslie had given her, she headed up the stairs to his room. She felt strange as she tried to think of how to actually get Justin talking when he got home.

The carpeted stairs made her steps sound light as she jogged up the rest of the way and then turned to the left. She went to the first door on the left; there was a small black door hanger on the doorknob that read "Bates Motel, Please Make Up Room".

She raised her eyebrows at this and turned the knob letting herself into Justin's room.

He gave the appearance of a "rebel" and she expected his room to be no different, probably messy, covered in posters, clothes and CDs thrown every-which-way, but it wasn't. In fact, his room was almost obsessively clean.

Bed was made, the few posters that were up were backed and one was from a martial arts movie she'd seen a few years ago. A signature in permanent marker was written across it. She could make out a D and an L in the signature, but that was it. A framed university degree hung over the bed.

The desk was small in the corner. On it sat a silver/grey laptop lid down and a small robot plushie sat beside it as well as a black coffee cup full of pens, pencils, and multicoloured highlighters.

The bookshelves were neatly organized too and Kira was beginning to wonder if she was in the right room…

"Weird," she remarked as she wandered over to the bookshelf and began scanning the titles.

She hadn't heard of most of the books that were there and a chunk looked like an area strictly for textbooks. She recognized a few of her own in that area.

She looked over at his laptop and bit her bottom lip as she struggled with her conscience. She'd managed to get into his room, but what was she looking for? Could his computer hold the answer? What if he came back? How did he have a university degree already? Was this breaking and entering? The last thing she needed was to be arrested…

Deciding she'd come this far she went over to the desk and sat down in the red slightly padded chair and lifted the lid of the laptop up. The screen flickered and revealed a green screensaver. She wiggled the mouse a bit and the screensaver shut off revealing an old online interview with the Space Rangers.

She started to read it when she heard the door downstairs open and close and footsteps bolting up the stairs. She winced as she realised Justin must be home now.

"Honey there's a-" Leslie began.

Kira didn't hear the rest of the sentence as the door flew open and she quickly shut the lid of the laptop.

There was a stunned silence as the two looked at each other.

She was startled by his appearance.

The "jerk" that had hurt her teacher's feeling had a thin cut across his cheek and a bruise forming on his arm that she could see since part of his shirt had been torn away and a gold bracelet (watch perhaps?) was revealed that she hadn't noticed him wearing before.

His eyes were wide but his face held a neutral (though slightly stunned) expression, she just looked back and swallowed nervously.

"Hi?" she offered lamely.

He snapped out of the weird trance he was in immediately and headed towards his closet.

"Where were you fifteen minutes ago?" he muttered bitterly as he pulled his ripped shirt over his head and threw it on the bed. She looked away quickly but he appeared unaffected by her presence, "When those stupid lizard things were attacking me where were you? Isn't it your job or something to stop that kind of stuff?"

She looked back stared at him in confusion. No, how could he know? Maybe he didn't and he was just bluffing, but how would he connect her to it?

It made her head hurt and she wasn't sure what to say.

Sliding a dark green shirt over his head and wincing lightly as he did, he rolled his eyes at her silence, "Why are you here?"

She nearly choked on her gum as she attempted to think of something other than the reason than she was there. "I n-need science help." She replied as she remembered her plan from before, she hadn't expected him to not be home when she'd made it up, "yeah."

He narrowed his eyes, "Yeah right," he snorted seeing through her story "get out."

Startled by his harsh command she found herself unable to move, "I want to know what's going on with you and Dr. O." she blurted out then frowned, "Why do you hate him so much?"

"You wouldn't understand."

"Try me." She shot back.

He scowled at her as he kneeled down and pulled a first aid kit out from underneath his bed, "Go fight your monsters and leave me alone." He popped the lid off the plastic container and pulled out what looked like a wet nap and patted in on his face. He winced as he did.

Kira looked down at the ground and let out a sad sigh, "Please?" she attempted the added a bit more awkwardly, "Need help?"

He glared at her, "No."

She watched as he patched himself up. Now that she thought about it, he looked kind of familiar, just a small tug at her memory, something that was barely there.

She scanned his room for clues again but she couldn't see anything that jogged her memory until she saw light coming through the fabric of Justin's pants. He appeared startled by it and pulled it out and threw it onto the bed. It was his key chain, one key glowing bright blue.

The colour triggered something and a small squeaky voice spoke inside her head.

"_Guys! I'm the new blue ranger!" _

"Oh. My. God." She gasped as it hit her like a ton of bricks, "You're that kid from the video!"

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Bit of a cliffy eh? 


	2. Chapter 2

"Video," Justin grunted angrily, "he made a video. Where the hell did he get footage for that?"

Kira swallowed nervously, "Uh… well, I don't know actually-"

Justin rolled his eyes as he glared at the small blue light on his bed. "Forget it, it was rhetorical. Look, please, just leave."

Kira shifted uncomfortably and scratched the back of her neck as she glanced around the room, trying to look anywhere but at the very annoyed young man and the glowing blue light. His voice had soften considerably as if he was just about ready to collapse from exhaustion.

She found she couldn't move when she tried to leave and put on her best brave face.

"No! No, I am not leaving until you go down to Hayley's and apologize! He's been there everyday this week waiting for you! You're tearing the poor guy apart." She snapped, doing a complete turnaround in attitude that startled the Blue Ranger.

Justin looked down and shook his head. "I don't-"

"Go!" Kira insisted getting braver as Justin began to falter slightly. "Whatever he did to you, he feels sorry for!"

Growling, the young man slammed his fist into the bed as he pulled off his watch and threw it onto the bed with his key.

He didn't know. He couldn't understand the pain he'd been through, being the freak with no friends. The freak who had had to put up with being the Space Rangers "helper", the annoying little kid in his school, university, and when he was finally getting away from that, being forced back into high school!

Tommy had always been popular and attractive. He'd had Kim and Kat, the two most attractive girls at the school at the time; he'd had the most powers, the best sparring form. Even with his absent mindedness and stupid long hair, he'd always been a favorite of teachers and students alike. He'd felt privileged to have Tommy as a friend once, but now he recognized that he wasn't any of that.

Tommy Oliver was manipulative and used him. On reflection, there was no doubt in his mind that with the looks he'd been given by the former Turbo Ranger when he morphed that he felt this wasn't the right place. As soon as Rocky got better, he knew he wanted Justin to pass his powers back to him.

Justin blinked rapidly. "Go away, Kira."

Looking out the window, Kira saw a set of headlights and heard a car pull into the driveway of the house. She glanced back over at Justin, who held his face in his hands. She was getting through to him, just a little extra push and he'd be running over to Hayley's to talk…

"He's trying to apologize, let him."

A loud honking was heard and Justin looked out his window sadly at the jeep, sitting there. He let his head fall and he looked at the ground.

"I was in high school with Tommy." Justin said distantly as he stared out the window at the car. "We were friends… I thought. I mean, he was the Red Turbo Ranger and I was the blue one. I suppose that's what our friendship was based on… it was neat being friends with the most popular guy at school and being the twelve year old genius. He helped make sure no one picked on me, things like that."

Kira swallowed and listened to the story with interest. She hadn't know he'd been in High School that young.

"When he passed on his powers to TJ, he and the others, Adam, Tanya, Kat… they all kind of… left me. I tried to keep in contact, but I never seemed to call at the right time and rarely did I get calls back. I suppose Kat has a reason being in London, but still… I stayed in Angel Grove, when the Command Center was destroyed; I helped the others get into space. I heard from them once after that. Then I went to Angel Grove U for a while, bitter that I couldn't seem to keep in contact with any of my friends. I worked hard, got a degree, but then my Dad got remarried. You've met her, she made us move to Reefside and sent me back to High School, complaining I'm "anti-social"" Justin sighed making quotation with his fingers. "Here, I thought, okay, maybe my Angel Grove life sucked, but at least I'll get a fresh start-"

"And then you saw Dr. O." Kira finished in understanding.

Justin shook his head. "I wanted to forget about the rangers, you know? I mean the fact that stupid jeep is here doesn't make things easier…"

"Jeep?" Kira asked curiously getting up and wandering over to the window where a blue jeep was sitting in the driveway, lights flashing, and no driver. "Zord?"

"You could say that." Justin sighed in response as he picked up his watch and keys and stuff them in his pockets. "I've got to go take care of this before Leslie starts' wondering what the hell is going on."

Kira sighed. Well at least now she knew the whole story and the young man seemed to have calmed down immensely. She felt a small anger at Dr. Oliver, for ignoring him, but held it in. He must have had a good reason; this was Dr. O after all.

"Please talk to him."

Justin looked over at her. He swallowed uncomfortably. Why had he just told her everything? What had changed in the passed five minutes? Maybe he hoped she'd leave once she knew, but apparently that wasn't the case.

"Come on, you can meet Storm Blaster." He sighed gesturing for her to follow him.

"The jeep has a name?" Kira asked curiously, abandoning her books in his room and following him downstairs where Leslie watched the two with interest.

Rolling his eyes he shoved the door open and the yellow clad teen followed him over to where the car was. It appeared to be upset, the door popped open and Justin climbed in. Kira followed.

The car took off down the street, making distinct car noises as it did. It popped the glove compartment and Justin shook his head. It automatically closed. Yelping as the seatbelts automatically did themselves up, Kira vaguely noticed they were headed towards Hayley's.

Was this normal?

She let out a sigh. "Why won't you talk to him?"

Justin looked down, his hands clenched into fists. "I just-"

"He's come to you and put up with a lot. He wants your friendship back, he wants your trust."

Justin pinched the bridge of his nose. "I don't know if I can trust him, after all this. I mean, it just… hurts so much. You know you're the first person to visit me in over three years? I can't seem to get comfortable around people anymore."

"You've had no one to talk to?"

"No, I can't explain most of the story to people anyways because of the whole identity thing. This is probably why I'm spilling my guts right now."

Kira smiled sadly at him as the jeep came to a stop outside Hayley's. She looked inside to see Tommy and Conner sitting together at the counter. Tommy was looking down at his coffee while Conner appeared to have a smoothie of some sort in front of him.

The Red Ranger had started sitting with their science teacher a day earlier to keep him company and to jolt him awake when it was closing time. She thought it was a sweet thing for the jock to do for his science teacher, even though she wasn't sure Tommy fully appreciated it.

Justin rolled his eyes. "Thanks Storm Blaster, just what I need right now." He groaned sarcastically as the doors flew open and he and Kira nearly fell out when the jeep suddenly backed up. "Okay! I'm getting out!"

Stepping out he let out a sad sigh as he stared at the café for a few seconds. He swallowed nervously, turning to Kira.

On one hand he was still pissed at Tommy… and Kira, and the jeep, and was in no mood to talk.

But on the other hand he wanted this over with, he wanted to move on. He wanted the jeep and Kira to leave him alone about this.

He looked at the door and with quite a bit of pushing from the Yellow Ranger, headed towards the door.

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What happens? That's up to you. I couldn't really end it one way or the other. No, I'm not going to update this. Thank you for all the support guys, it was just a crazy idea that popped into my head one day that started with Sugar and Lemons and has become a roller coaster ride since.

If you haven't read Conversations, it explains a bit why Conner is with Tommy. So check it out.


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